Auntie stared into the flames, searching.
Then—did I imagine it?—Auntie seemed to flinch and look away. There was a sharp intake of breath, as if the fire had dealt her a blow.
“What is it?” I asked, leaning toward her. “What did you see?”
“Nothing,” Auntie said, looking away from me, but I knew her well enough to tell that she was lying. Auntie had seen something terrible in my future, something dark enough to make her turn away.
“Tell me,” I said, putting my hand on her arm. “Please.”
She shook my hand off as if I were a pesky insect. “There is nothing to tell,” Auntie snapped.
“Please,” I repeated, grabbing her arm again, my hand touching the soft deerskin coat. “I know you saw something.”
Her eyes turned dark, and she reached down and gave the back of my hand a hard pinch. I jerked my hand away and drew back.
“As I said, the moon is not right for such things. Maybe next time you will listen.”
Auntie gazed back into the fire, which was dying back down, all the bright colors gone. I moved even farther away, wrapped my arms around my knees, and slid closer to the heat. My hand stung where she had pinched it, and I wondered if she had broken the skin, but knew better than to look. Best to ignore the pain, to pretend it hadn’t happened.
After a few moments of uneasy silence, she looked my way.
“What I can tell you is this: you are special, Sara Harrison, but you already know this. You have something inside you that makes you different from others.” She looked at me with such seriousness that my chest felt heavy. “Something that shines bright, gives you the same gifts I have. The gifts of sight, of magic. It makes you stronger than you know. And, oh, little Sara, let me tell you this.” She smiled, rocking forward, throwing another stick onto the fire. It crackled and popped as it caught. “If you ever grow up and have a girl child, the gift will be passed down double to her. That girl will walk between the worlds. She will be as powerful as I am, maybe more. I have seen it in the fire.”
How I wish Auntie were here now, how I ache for her. There are a thousand questions I would ask. But first I would tell her she was right that night long ago when she stared into the fire—my Gertie was special. She’d seen things others hadn’t. Things like the blue dog and the winter people. She’d walked between the worlds.
I am in bed now. A short while ago, Lucius came up to give me my nightly cup of rum. He also delivered a box of ribbon candy.
“This is from Abe Cushing,” Lucius said. I nodded, watched him put the candy on my bedside table. Abe runs the general store. He is a man of few words, but he loved Gertie—was always sneaking her lemon drops and toffee when we went in to pick up sugar and flour, or cloth and thread for a new dress.
Lucius looked down at me. His eyes were bright and clear; his shirt was unwrinkled, impeccably white. How did he manage always to look so tidy?
“Where’s Amelia?” I asked.
“Downstairs,” he said. “I thought I’d come check on you tonight.” He laid a hand on my forehead, then placed two fingers on my wrist, feeling for my pulse. “How are you feeling?”
I did not answer. What did he expect me to say?
“Martin is very worried about you,” he said. “Your outburst today with Reverend Ayers was inexcusable.”
I bit my lip, said nothing.
“Sara,” he said, bending over so that his face was right in front of mine. “I understand that you are grieving. We all are. But I’m asking you to make more of an effort.”
“An effort?” I asked, puzzled.
“Gertie is gone,” he said. “But you and Martin, you’ve got to go on living.”
Then he left me alone with my rum, which I drank in two long swallows as I settled back into the pillows, the weight of the quilt on top of me feeling impossibly heavy.
Gertie is gone, Lucius told me.
But then I hear Amelia’s voice in my head: The dead never really leave us.
And I think of what Auntie taught me long ago: that death is not an ending, but a beginning. The dead cross over to the world of the spirits and are surrounding us still.
“Gertie,” I say aloud. “If you’re here, please give me a sign.” Then I wait. I lie under the covers and I wait until I ache. I wait for a whisper, the feeling of soft fingers writing letters into my palm, even a few raps on a table, as Amelia described.
But there is nothing.
I am alone.
Visitors from the Other Side
The Secret Diary of Sara Harrison Shea
January 23, 1908